The Skelos trial, involving ex-state Senate Majority Leader Dean Skelos, 67, and his son Adam, 33, is drawing to a close. The case involves charges of corruption and accusations that the duo used the father's position of power to pressure companies into giving the son no-show work and kickbacks.
Giving evidence of the power games the father-son duo indulged in, the prosecution played a wiretapped conversation of the younger Skelos trying to push Demetrios Raptis, a Greek diner association head, into doing business with him.
"Every time you call me, you see my father's name in the paper, right?" he asks.
"No," Raptis replies.
"You have my cellphone number," Skelos lectured. "It's a privilege to have that number. Now if you want to utilize my f--king reach and business opportunity, then you call me and I'll set up a meeting. Do you think I'm limited to, to, to gas? Is that it? I'm not going to say this on the phone. You could have heard those opportunities in person, but you wanted to not do that," the younger Skelos lectured, according to the New York Daily News.
If the defense does not present any new evidence, closing arguments could begin as early as Tuesday afternoon, and the jury could begin deliberating as early as Wednesday, reports The New York Times.
But the defense was unwilling to reveal much. "We think that decision is properly made at the close of the government's case," said lawyer, G. Robert Gage, on whether the former senator will take the stand in his son's corruption trial, reports the New York Post.
